Painting the Desert Red
by PhantomInTheWind
Summary: I know I wished I had lived longer and I know I wished I could make her smile on last time, but just so we're clear, I did NOT wish for this! - In which an agent who specialised in black ops is given another chance at life. The problem is, at what cost? - Rated M for Graphic description of violence, insanity, mild coarse language and possible mature themes. Male OC insert.
1. Prologue

I do not own, nor do I claim to own, Naruto. This is a work of fiction that is non-profit. Please enjoy.

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Prologue:

Honestly, I'm surprised I didn't die sooner. I was a special agent (whose forte was in _black ops_ ), in his forties with plenty of enemies out for my head. I just wish I died a little later, preferably when was old and had lived out my life to the fullest. Not shot by a drug lord's goon. At least I went with a bang. Literally, they shot me in an abandoned factory with a Desert Eagle .50 for crying out loud. I hope they went deaf.

In my last 7 seconds, I saw my life flash before my eyes. My boring, un-eventful childhood, my first time (both killing and having sex), my not-so-boring youth (filled with enough blood and gore to make 10 horror movies), going past my prime, my grandparents funeral, my marriage that stopped before it started. All of my memories in 7 seconds. Then, well nothing.

Still is nothing now.

I thought I'd be sent to Hell, or Purgatory, considering all the things I'd done. No way was I gonna go to Heaven. But no, just my luck to be stuck in _Limbo_ of all places. Or maybe this is just my personal Hell. Stuck doing nothing after a life of action.

I'd gone through the seven stages of grief, and had dealt with my shock a long time ago. Now I was just kind of floating, bored. I didn't really have a body, just a kind of conscious. I thought back on my life, like I'd done previously many, many times before. But this time I thought about what I'd miss or maybe who'd miss me.

I wasn't exactly the social type (I had colleuges that filled my socialising needs) and my parents still hated me for coming out as bi... Would they miss me? I wasn't their only son, I wasn't their youngest or their oldest. In fact, I was the type of person whom they hated.

I just couldn't picture my mother crying at my funeral, my father reassuring her as he looked sadly down at my casket- empty probably. I couldn't see my brother or sister crying either.

My colleagues would more likely miss my skills rather than me. I was known as hard worker and someone who was exceedingly good at hand-to-hand combat. I had worked at the agency for half my life, so of course quite a few people from work would show up, but I doubt there would be any real grief. I think it would seem more of a obligatory attendance, seeing as I was a senior officer.

The only person I could picture being truly sad would have to be Mary, my niece.

I know she would miss me. I felt a warm contented feeling fill me. It was nice to remember at least one person cared. Probably. I miss her too. I miss dotting on her, laughing with her, conspiring with her, pretending to be a ninja with her...

Man I haven't thought about that in ages. I fondly looked back at my memories that held Mary in them. I remember the time I took her for icecream and we saw a movie together, cause her _father_ was busy with work. I remember the time she introduced me to-anime was it? I remember her smiling happily at the computer as characters fought and talked. I remember her complete and utter obsession with the anime/comic (wait it has a special name right? Mangi? No. Mangu? No. Mango? No... Manga! Yeah it's called manga right?) called - 'Naruto' was it?

Yeah, she was obsessed with 'Naruto' for _years_ , even bought a bunch of costumes from it. She begged me to teach her some martial arts because of it too. She pratically forced me to memorise everything about it, not that I minded really. The characters were interesting enough (well interesting enough for a guy in his late twenties), the plot was amusing, the fighting styles a mix of captivating and down right hilarious. The history was my favourite though, they way everything was exceedingly realistic, and the countries relationships were striking similar to some in our world.

But my favourite thing by far was the way it made her smile. I'd happily learn a bunch of different-admittedly odd (weird)-hand signs, teach myself different styles of marital arts, memorise a bunch of useless facts about a fictional world, learn to throw senbon needles, shuriken and kunai, Hell, learn a completely different language if it ment that she'd smile. I gladly eat a ton of shitty ramen noddles and waste my weekends and spare time watching a cartoon, cause I know that it'd make her happy.

The warm content feeling that had been spreading put through my 'body' receed into a cold, lonely, melancholy feeling as I remembered that I could never go back and see Mary again. I could never eat shitty take-away foods while binge watching a cartoon again. No more random pop quizzes, no more learning those hand signs. I could never do any of that again.

The one thing I'd miss about that world wouldn't be the killing, not the blood nor the money but my niece and her smiles. Her crack theories about characters and her happiness. I felt sad, no I felt devastated. Why? Because I know that I'd never get to see her again, I'd been gone too long for any sort of miracle to happen. I just wish that there was something I could do to make her smile one last time. No matter who small.

As if on que, voices started buzzing. I couldn't tell from where, Hell, I couldn't tell up from down or left from right. What I could tell was that they were getting closer. My training kicked in, training that had basically been ingrained into every fibre of my being.

 _Stay low. They probably know your here, but don't let them know that you know. Act how you normally would, no tencing, no stances. Completely relaxed. Gather information. Don't act until you know what the situation fully. Listen. Listen. **Listen.**_

So listen I did.

 _"...a kind of bor...cha think? I wish some...ould happen! Maybe a new..."_

 **"I heard a wish coming from ov...could be the chance we've be...for. Wanna check it o..."**

Damn it! They were getting closer but there voices seemed to be fading in and out! Shit! I need to listen harder!

 _"Sounds promising! What - should we put - in?"_

 **"Dunno. Maybe the - one? It would be the most - to watch!"**

Damn! I could hear them fine now, the voices weren't fading, but certain words seemed to be cut out and replaced with a buzzing sound. It sounded like I was trying to tune into a exceedingly touchy radio station that kept cutting to static.

 _"Your right -! It would - be the most -!"_

 **"Hmmm... So - their name, _?"**

 _"Ahh let's -..."_ I heard paper rustling. Is there even filing in the after life? Maybe that's what He'll is, fling paper work for all eternity. That would definitely be tort- no Marshel! Listen!

 _"Aha! Here - -! Let's see... Marshel Hyde, died 17 th of - in the year of - aged 42- aww he was still pretty - _!"_

 **"I know _, that's why they have a better chance of -. Anything else?"**

 _"Uhhhhhhh, male, adores his niece, antisocial... Hmmm... Nothing of - really... Wait! He was a special agent! Trained to -! Niece had an obsession with - - - and practically forced him to learn a lot of - about it! Oooh, he'd be a loose - -! Anyway, died of a shot to the -, while he was on a -. Top of his class in hand to hand combat, not bad at - either! Pretty bright -."_

 **"And what was his -, _? Would it be strong enough?"**

 _"His wish? Let's see... Awwww! He just wanted to make his - smile on last time! Now that's -!"_

 **"Yeah it is pretty cute, but is it - enough?"**

 _"To get him -, yes."_

 **"Will he survive to do enough dama- I mean - anything? Anything -?"**

 _Don't underestimate this one's - to live, _._ _He should have died - or so odd years -, but was stubborn and - willed himself to live! Did it a - times actually."_

 **"So he's - enough?"**

 _"Yep!"_

 **"Then let's - to it!"**

 _"Aye, - sir!"_

What.

WHAT?!

 _I feel kinda funny..._

I heard my name.

They knew about me.

 _Huh. I can't see anything as usual, but everything is getting dimmer somehow..._

They knew about everything.

What co uld this mean?

 _Why do I f eel like I'm f alling ?_

Wha t coul d they do?

Are they gonn a hurt me?

G ahhh! I nee d mo re

in for mation.

 _C an yo u e ven f al l in L i mb o ?_

W ha t a re

t he y go ing to d o?

I d on 't

kn o w wh a

.

W

H

A

T

'

S

H

A

P

P

E

N

I

N

G

?

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Author note: Hello, PhantomInTheWind here, I'd just like you all to know that I'm really happy that you chose to read my story! Now, this is the first story I've posted on this site, so if there any odd spacing, or the page layout seems weird please let me know, along with any errors that have slipped by me. I am not the best at keeping to specific update times, so I'm sorry if you have to wait for a while, but I plan to have a few chapters up in the up coming months.

In the conversation the dashes are ment to represent words and the underscores the names of the voices. I had originally made sure that the number of dashes matched the number of letters in the word, but won't let me save it like that... (Same goes for the underscores. Apparently 1 is the maximum...) I'm sure you could figure out the missing words though! Hopefully...

Thank you for reading and have a nice day!


	2. Chapter 1

Chapter 1:

My consciousness was brought back when I was in a dark, warm place. It was a startling change from... Wait, where was I before? The darkness took my attention when it stated to squish me, moving me towards somewhere. I stated to panic. _What has happening? Where am I? Am I hurt? Am I dying? Was there anything I could do? Anything? Anything?_

An innumerable amount of things -information- started rushing around in my mind, seeming to drown out my conscious. It was as if those questions had opened up flood gates, which were holding back a torrent of information.

 _CPR, DRABCD, hold your breath, keep calm your oxygen will last longer, red, lots of red, happiness, sadness, anger, annoyance, piano lessons, awkward interactions with people, first jobs, first crushes, bullets, pain, laugh-_

It was like a barrage of information, it hurt my head and made me dizzy. I barely noticed the temperature go from hot to freezing in a matter of seconds. So I did what was natural, I breathed in a gulp of fresh air, wriggled around and started to scream. _Why was I screaming? Screaming won't help! Why did I want to scream?_ I heard noises, voices. They sounded angry and shocked and their anger seemed to be directed at me. I stopped screaming and my mind went into overdrive.

 _What?! WHAT?! Was I under attack? No that's a stupid question, of course I was under attack! Quick, quick! Any information that could help me live?!_

My mind was harassed with what seemed like a whole life times worth of information. I could feel blood and something else pounding, inducing a county-sized headache. My mind started growing 'dim' and losing focus. _No no no no no! I can't loose consciousness yet!_ Fear and adrenaline coursed through my veins and my mind cleared. I had to work quickly before I blacked out. I picked at the closest piece 'information'.

 _A soft breeze danced through the trees' changing leaves as we both leaned in close, not close enough for our lips to touch, but so, so close. I took a breath, le-_

Discarded. Useless. That won't help me survive! I grabbed at the next closest 'information' and was faintly aware of the voices getting louder and my body being shoved into something- or someone- who held me. The voices got louder and angrier which just made me more desperate to find useful information.

The gun in my hands seemed heavier than before and my Kevlar vest seemed to constrict my chest. I took a deep, calming breath and double checked to see if my safety was off. It was. "Put down your weapon, or I will be forced to shoot." My voice was calm and indifferent, as if I had down this thousands of times before. I hadn't though, this would be my first.

 _The man sneered and laughed. He held his gun up to aim with practised ease. "Hmmm, no~" He laughed manically and my finger pressed down on the trigger. A bang, a thud and the man was no more. Blood seeped from beneath his corpse as his lunatic grin spread across his face. This was it. No goin-_

I stopped (Listening? Watching?) it. Hmm. Useful. I looked at the next one.

 _A rush of fire ran through my veins-_

No, how could that help? I already had fear causing a fire in my stomach.

 _A heat pricked at the edges of my eyes-_

No, that won't help.

I was faintly aware of the fact that the voices were getting quieter, and I was being jostled at regular intervals. A soft cooing voice was heard and my body, almost against my will, started to relax. Adrenaline stopped pumping and my mind started fogging up. _No. Nonononononononono! I need to stay awake! I need to... stay awake... I need to..._

 _I stretched out on my niece's floor and lay there for a moment, pondering. Mary had fallen asleep at least 3 episodes ago, but I just didn't have the will to turn off the laptop or stop the playlist. It had been an interesting few episodes for they had been explaining a certain redheads past. It was... accurate to say the least and I could almost definitely see myself doing the same, had I been in his shoes._

 _I had to admit, there was a stark difference to how Jinjurikis were treated in different villages, and I had to wonder if Naruto would have ended up the same way if Konoha had been like Suna. A small chuckle escaped my lips as I pictured what would happen if I asked my niece. She'd just smile at me and drag me to her laptop where she'd find some fanfiction about it and would explain (in excruciating detail) about everything right, wrong and what could and would happen. She'd factor in the village, wether Naruto knew or not, his personality, the personality of others until she'd come to her final conclusion. She'd definitely be a great writer one day if she kept thinking like that. Picturing the characters as real people and how they'd interact with people and what their reactions would be._

 _I glanced at my watch and sighed. I stood up, stretched again, shut her laptop, tucked her into bed and headed off. Of course I had a mission tonight, in a few hours actually. What was it again, Drug Lords?_

My eyes felt heavy, my whole body felt heavy. I stared blearily upwards as some sort of brown, hessian fabric came into view. A soft, warm glow seemed to seep through the fabric and illuminate the room I was in. It wasn't too bright, nor was it too dark, it was just the right amount of light.

I tried turning my head to get a better look at the room I was in. My head lolled to the side in a clunky manner and I could see the brown fabric stretching across the room, encompassing it completely. The 'wall' seemed very far away from me and the ground was covered in tattered, woven mats. I could see some sort of cream coloured fabric, that I seemed to be lying on, and another, larger, sheet of the same fabric not to far away from the edge of my one. There were some blankets neatly folded at the edge of the larger piece fabric along with a small satchel looking looking thing. I think. I don't think could see that well. In the upper left 'corner' of the room were the 'wall' met the mats, an old chair was sitting there with an old lady resting in it. Everything in this room seemed old and weathered.

Wait, there was some else here! I can't let my guard down, even for an old lady! I started to panic and flail around, my movements heavy and uncoordinated. It was only when my hand hit my face that I stopped. I tried to bring it away from my face slowly, but it ended up being a very fast jerking motion, which seemed to pull my shoulder with it. I stared at my hand, which was now blocking out part of the light.

It didn't seem like my hand. For one, I remember my hand being a lot larger than what it was right now, and not nearly as smooth. The fingers were tiny and seemed a fair bit more pointed than I remember, but what gave it a way was the skin. Now, I wasn't the darkest man in the world, but I definitely had darker skin than the milky white that covered my current hand. My mother had come from Brazil and my father from Spain, I was in no way, shape or form considered 'white'. My natural skin tone was a caramel brown, and that was even darker because of all the time I spent in the sun.

I tried moving my hand and it responded by clenching into a fist. I blinked. Trying again, I un-clenched my hand. I brought up my other hand, still in the same fast, jerking motion, and it was as pale as the first. I frowned a bit as I noticed that my skin seemed to be translucent. I glanced at my wrists and I could see the blue veins running throughout them. My eyes traveled down my arms, and I could again see the veins at my elbows. Odd.

My arms seemed chubbier than before. They weren't nearly as well toned as I remember. I tried moving my arms, hands and fingers, and while they did respond, it was in odd clumsily movements. I seemed to have very little motor control. I tried this with my legs.

I brought them up and I could see that they where the same shade of white as my arms. I looked up and down my legs critically. From the tips of my toes to where my thighs met my underwear. My feet were chubbier, as were my calves and thighs, and my toes were tiny and pink. I could bend my knees just fine, and I could curl and uncurl my toes, but anything that was more precise than that, didn't work. I had about the same motor control as a baby! Frowning, I let out a soft growl. I froze when I heard my voice. It was high. Really high. Shit. _What happened to me?! Who did this?! What's going on?! Can I do anything?_

My mind started to panic and my head pounded again as wave after wave of information hit me. Ah fuck, not this again.

 _Stay clam, assess your situation, keep quiet, call for help, scream, go to sleep, rationalise everything, a boy blushing at me, cold, heat, a girl blushing at me, fear, joy, list everything you know, family dinners, sweet food, salt, sour food, spic-_

I forced everything back into the depths of my mind and took a breath. My head pounded like two jackhammers were drilling into it. Okay, okay, clam down Marshel. If you panic like that it hurts, so let's not panic, okay? I took a few more deep breaths and closed my eyes.

First of all, what did I know for sure? _Well, I'm pale as fuck, my motor control is shit, I was now pudgy, my eye sight was pretty bad, my everything was a lot smaller than it used to be, I'm in a brown tent thing, I'm lying on a piece of fabric, everything here is huge, there's an old woman in the chair and everything here seems old and worn._

Okay, even in my head that sounded strange. What could have happened to cause this? Well one hell of a hallucinogen, I'm in some sort of weird dream/coma or... or... I frowned slightly and opened my eyes again. None of those seemed quite right. This seemed too specific and too detailed for a hallucinogen to make, same goes for dream and I'm not to sure about how comas work, but I'm fairly sure not like this. So what now?

I lay there thinking, for who knows how long. Ideas and theories ran through my head and I had to often break away from my thinking to push away the tide of information, that seemed to ebb and flow with my questions. While hadn't figured out what had happened to me, I had figured out how to (somewhat) control the information. To a degree.

It was like a text book. Majority of it was fairly useless and contained information that could either discarded or saved. My problem before had been I had asked more than one question and I was in a state of panic. The information rushed to answer the questions, but because of my state of panic, random information not relating to the question also surged forward. While it wasn't the most effective, I could find useful bits of information a lot easier if I was clam and had one question in mind. Most of the time. It was definitely going to be fun going through all that information.

A creaking noise alerted me and I was snapped back into the real world. The old woman wasn't in her chair anymore, but moving towards me. I started to freak out before forcefully reminding myself not to. No more headaches for me thank you.

She casually walked over to me and picked me up. How the- she was HUGE up close and easily able to hold me. She started to bounce me up and down as she walked around the room in a slow, measured pace. She started babbling to me softly. I stared at her. Her words were soft and soothing, but definitely not English or Spanish or any other western language really. It sounded familiar to me, but I didn't know why. Honestly her babbling and cooing sounded similar to the way people talk to babies.

She stocked my head fondly and touched my nose. I instinctively scrunched up my face. She laughed. It was a nice laugh, the laugh a grandmother would have. She started speaking again. I slowly caught on that she wasn't talking about nothing (well maybe she was, I'm not to sure) but I kept herding the word "Akuko" over and over. Was she addressing me? When she next said the word 'Akuko' I made a sound to show that I noticed she had been saying that over and over. It sounded like a mix between a gurgle and an 'ah' sound.

She stopped pacing and looked at me and started laughing. I think I quite like her laughing. She seemed lighter, happier. She spoke softly again and put me down on the chair before going outside through a flab nearly directly opposite the chair.

I had a view of the entire room from where I sat. While not everything was in perfect focus, I could make out majority of the room. I was pretty happy with that. I could see my piece of fabric (that was actually pretty thick, so probably a mattress of sorts), the larger piece of fabric (which I think is for the old woman), a few packs or something like that to the right, a blanket at the end of my 'bed', some books behind that, a small lantern sat by the larger bed the door and a staff with two blades sat propped up by the door. All in all it seemed like a pretty minimalistic place.

My eyes kept wandering as I drank in every detail of this place, and not to long after she had left, the old woman had returned. With a bucket of steaming something too. She sat down at the end of her 'bed' and opened the satchel thing, pulling out a box and a bottle. I watched as she put two little cups of the powder from the box into the bottle followed by the boiling water. She filled it about 2/3 of the way up and then got a canteen like thing from one of the packs to the right and filled the rest. Screwing on the lid, shaking it around and testing the temperature she finally headed back to me.

She picked me up and easily held me I one arm as she tried to feed me the stuff from the bottle. _Uhm, no. Pretty sure that bottles are for babies, no way am I drinking out of that._ My stomach on the other hand had other ideas. It rumbled menacingly and I drank the whole thing dry in no time flat. It tasted like shit and vomits mixed together with added flour. She smiled and then proceeded to lay on the large bed.

Opening the satchel again, she pulled out a piece of cloth. I started at her for a moment before she began to... um... Well she began to _change_ me. As in 'change a baby's diaper' change me. Fuck that was embarrassing. She took out the cloth which had been around my waist and take it outside. Holy fucking Hell. I don't think I'll ever be able to look her in the eye again. It bad enough being treated like a baby, being fed like one too, but _changing my diaper_ is where I draw the line. _Wait a minuet..._

My eyes widened as everything clicked. Small everything, everything about me is pudgy, everything here seems huge, being talked to like that, being fed like that, being changed. _Oh. Ohhhhhhhhh_.

I hoped you enjoyed the chapter! Now, xxOchibixx (sorry if I spelt it wrong) asked if I had any pairings in mind and if so, would they be male or female (not those exact words, but you get the idea.) I haven't any plans for a pairing yet, but if there is a love interest it probably won't be the main story plot. Maybe.

Anyway, for the boy or girl question I'm honestly not to sure, but I'm leaning more towards it being a guy.

But love, or love interests, won't happen for a while. For now we get to enjoy watching Marshel having to grow up again, with all his memories from his last life interrupting him! And he now lives in a tent. What fun!

Thank you for reading!


	3. Chapter 2

Chapter 2:

The next few days followed a regular pattern. I'd wake up and wish I had better bladder control, the old lady (to which I had started calling Granny) changed and fed me, Granny would read to me, I'd be fed again (possibly changed as well), I'd have a nap, Granny would usually read to me some more then I'd go to sleep. Rinse and repeat. It was definitely repetitive.

Sometimes Granny would take me outside. The outside world changed often, but it stayed the same as well. Outside the little tent I now called 'home' there was a vast desert. The dunes changed and often the arrangement of tents did too. Sometimes there was a cluster of animals in the distance. But it was always easy to recognise the harsh sun beating down and the sand that seemed to glow.

After the 2nd month of me being alive we started moving. Our small home was packed up and bundled away along with all of the meagre possessions it had. It was all packed away into several scrolls. Granny picked me up and we spent the rest of the day travelling with the people that lived in the other tents.

From what I could gather, we were a nomad tribe, travelling from place to place and never staying in one area for too long. Our 'tribe' consisted of a couple of hundred humans of varying ages (that all had the same green eyes and light hair), a few wagons or carts scattered about and a quite a lot pack animals.

I didn't understand why everyone else didn't just use the scrolls like Granny did. It was extremely effective and efficient. Some of the tribe members did, but not many, the rest relied on the animals to drag their belongings around for them. It was oddly frustrating, seeing them being so inefficient.

Another thing I noticed was the fact the no one offered to help Granny in anyway shape or form. We were at the back of the 'pack', behind even the animals. Whenever someone looked at us, they either scowled or looked away as if they were frightened.

I was honestly pissed at the tribe for not helping Granny. She was kind and nice. I saw a lot of mothers helping other mothers with their children, yet no one ever offered to help Granny with me. So, to strike back (because not being able to do anything can really get to you after a while), I was on my best behaviour and showed up those snotty brats that cried for their parents at every turn. It was petty, but there was little else I could do.

After the excitement of moving for the first time, everything become repetitive and boring once more. Granny would still read and speak in that odd language and we'd still be ignored by everyone else. Everything was so, so dull. Well outside my head, that is.

Inside, was a completely different story.

Now, I remember from somewhere that babies brains are made to soak up information, that's why it's harder to learn things like different languages later in life. The problem with my brain was that it was already dense with a whole lifetimes worth of knowledge. So, to clear it up a bit I started reorganising it. After all, I had all the time in the world.

I was a bit hesitant at first, deleting all of my memories. There were such a big part of me, they defined me as a person. They defined my actions, my fears, my likes, my dislikes, my traits, my quirks, my _everything_. I deleted small things at first, memories I didn't realise I had. Things like going down a slide at preschool, or reading a required-reading book for English, really memories I didn't feel attached to at first. Once I got used to it, getting rid of memories became quite easy.

It was a tedious process at first, I couldn't look at large amounts of information at once before I had a 'shutdown' or I lost conciseness. I started off with sorting the information (at a painfully slow rate) into two piles. "Useful" and "Useless". I quickly found out that the moment something was in the "Useless" pile, it was forgotten or (as I preferred to call it) 'permanently deleted'. I used that to my advantage.

The hard part was my family. I could sort out 'needed facts' from 'useless facts' quite easily when it came to anything else, but that was only because I didn't hold any sentimental value to them. Old crush from the seventh grade I barely remembered the name of? Gone, easy. Getting rid of the mother who raised me than disowned me? Not so much.

I had mixed feelings about my family. On one hand they hated me, were disgusted by me, disowned me for crying out loud! On the other hand, they were my family, my flesh and blood. Sure they hated me later in life, but earlier on they comforted me in a way only family could. They were my rock, my safety net. To get rid of them completely? I'm not sure I could do such a heartless thing, and that's saying something. I killed for a living, I learned early on that emotions were just a weak point and it was best just to get rid of them. Everyone has their weak points though.

I did end up deleting them. All my brothers, sisters, my mother, my father, my grandparents, my cousins, my nieces and nephews, _everyone_. When I was done, I had a cold, heavy feeling in my chest. It didn't feel like guilt, more like a form of regret, like I had just done something I knew was going to bite me in the ass later. No much I could do about it now though. They say we all have ghosts of our pasts, ghost we regret, but I wonder, can a ghost of my past haunt me for something I will never remember?

Then there was Mary. I couldn't delete anything connected to her in the slightest, even if I wanted to. I still had memories of late night sessions of binge watching shows, of theorising, of pop quizzes, of learning silly hand signs. I could delete my family yes, but I could never delete Mary, not so long as I live. Why? The answer is quite simple really. My life is-was dark. Looking back on it, really reflecting on it, re-watching every memory under a critical eye, it was easy for me to see that my life was about as bright as void. So like hell am I going to delete the only source of light I have.

After about two months of sorting and doing the same routine in the outside world, I had finally organised forty years worth of information. Now I was left with a huge mess of useful facts. So I organised everything further, after all I still had so much time before I could do anything.

I remembered seeing a piece of information that had a trick on it that seemed perfect. I dug around a bit and found it somewhere near the top of the pile. It was called a "Mind Palace". There used to be a memory attached to it, but I ended up getting rid of it. It seemed kind of 'incomplete' without it, but oh well.

I looked through the information. Okay, the first step is to decide on a blueprint. Hmm the more complicated the more space to store memory... Looking at the pile I have, I'm gonna need a huge place.

I shuffled though the information/memories and decided on one called "Maze of the Dead". I'm not sure why I didn't delete it, it was quite useless, but I'm glad I didn't. It was a series of catacombs that seemed to stretch forever. There was a memory attached to this called "Mission 17". After watching a few "Mission" memories, I had decided to keep all of them. Maybe I could view them at a later date.

I held the piece of information uncertainly. Did I just put it down and say _this is now my mind palace_? I mean, worth a shot... The moment it touched the 'ground' everything changed. What once was blank canvas of nothingness, became a large, complex system of tunnels and hidden passageways. I was shocked it was that easy.

For the next day or two I just spent time familiarising my self with my "Mind Palace". Well, "Mind Palace" seemed like the wrong name to call it. It was more like a "Mind Scape", hmmm... Maybe a "Mind Palape"? Or "Mind Scalace"? "Scapal"? "Lacesca"? Eh, I'll figure out a name later...

I spent every chance I could in my "Mind Palace/Scape", after all, the whole point of this place was to have information easily available. I couldn't exactly do that if I didn't know where everything was. After I was comfortable in my "Mind Palace/Scape" I started sorting information into it. That took a lot longer than expected.

First off, if took me a really fucking long time to actually, you know sort the information. Then, I decided that I really hated that configuration, so I changed it. After that I switched a few more things around before thinking Wouldn't it be best for the survival tactics to go with the killing techniques? So the format was changed again. This happened several times over the course of the next few months until I was pretty happy. It was a complete mess. An organised mess yes, but still a mess. I swear that no one else but me could ever figure out where anything was in this mess.

So after about 7 months of faffing around in my head, I decided to (finally) actually pay attention to the outside world.

To say that everything had changed would be kinda right and wrong. The scenery was still the same (as always) but things were different. There was more hate than apprehension in the tribe's eyes now and Granny was working a bit. It took me a minuet before I figured it out. I had practically been doing nothing for 7 months. Now, I'm not sure how fast babies learn, but I'm pretty sure that picking up nothing after 7 fucking months is pretty bad. So I had a lot to catch up on.

I had a few main priorities, but I decided that my first and for most should be coordinated movements. I spent two weeks non-stop trying to relearn walking and standing. This is where my memories became useful. I had so much information on moving my body (even if most of it was about martial arts techniques) that I got the whole walking and moving thing down after two weeks. The only thing I didn't realise was that Granny would have noticed my sudden incline in learning abilities. The odd thing though was that she didn't try to slow me down, no instead the crazy woman encouraged me.

She helped my go from barely being able to go from lying down to sitting up to being able to walk at a pretty fast rate for a 7 and a half month old. Next she started to teach me how to talk. She said things in a certain way and repeated certain phrases so many times that I could quite easily recognise objects and people. She always expected me to say the name of something when she pointed it out to me. This little exercise reminded me of Mary's pop quizzes and it quickly grew to be my favourite past time. She didn't let me get away with mispronouncing anything either, she'd immediately correct me and force me to repeat the word ten times and if I messed up saying it again, she'd make me say it twenty times. Needless to say, I rarely said words wrong.

Knowing a language before this one really helped, after all, I only had to 'translate' the words rather than have to learn learn them. Good in someways, not so much in others. I knew complex words that 6 year olds had trouble understanding and that wasn't such a good thing.

You'd be surprised how much you can do once you have a basic grasp of a language (and an extensive knowledge of another) and can move around fairly well on your own. Adults don't tend to pay attention to kids - well, baby in this case - and what they might overhear. After all, no kid should know the words 'abomination', 'devil', 'demon' or 'cursed' not really anyway. Unfortunately for me, I did.

My life before this one was dark, there's no way I can put a lighthearted spin on it. It was cruel, violent and overall horrible. At 8 months old I found out that my new life was going to be a whole lot worse.

I don't know how to create a lone blank so this is my solution. Please ignore this.

Sorry for the wait. I had to re-write it a few times before I was happy (even though I'm not really) with it. Hopefully the next chapter will be out sooner. Thank for reading and have a great day!


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